Attack on the Springer Building

Yesterday, Friday May 19, at 3:55 pm, two bombs exploded in the Springer Building in Hamburg. Despite prompt and early warnings, the building wasn’t evacuated and 17 people were injured. At 3:29 pm, the first warning was given to number 3471, who was told to evacuate the building within 15 minutes because a bomb would detonate shortly. The answer was, “Stop this nonsense.” The call was cut off. With a second call at 3:31 pm, we said, “If you don’t evacuate immediately, something horrible will happen.” But the telephone operators obviously had instructions not to pay attention to such calls. The third call, at 3:36 pm, was to the cops saying, “Goddamn it, see to it that the building is immediately evacuated.” Because the Springer Corporation can’t cover up the fact that they were warned, they distort it, stating, “There was only one call and it came too late.” Two telephone operators and the police can confirm that the Springer Press is lying once again.

Springer would rather risk his workers and staff being injured by a bomb than risk losing a couple of hours of work time, and therefore profit, as a result of a false alarm. For capitalists, profit is everything, and the people who make it for them are dirt. We regret that workers and staff were injured.

Our demands of Springer: that his newspapers stop the anticommunist hysteria against the New Left, against working class solidarity actions such as strikes, and against communist parties here and in other countries; that the Springer Corporation stop the hysteria against liberation movements in the Third World, especially against the Arab people who struggle for the freedom of Palestine; that he stop his propagandistic support for Zionism—the imperialist politics of the Israeli ruling class; that the Springer Press stop spreading lies about foreign workers here.

We demand that the Springer Press print this communiqué.

We demand nothing impossible. We will stop our attacks on the enemies of the people if our demands are met.